Comfortable Silence
by Miyazaki A2
Summary: A dialouge-less, short little oneshot that is kind of hard to explain. NejiTen TenNeji


**_Hey, buds. _**

**_I wrote this sort of as an excersize in style, all in one sitting. I had to prove to myself that i can manage to come up with stuff besides LeeSaku._**

* * *

She stood in the middle of the training field, totally alone for once. She tried not to wonder where in the world everyone was. She tried not to wonder about anything at all. She reveled in the aloneness, the quiet, and let out a long, silent sigh. She reached up to the top of her head and pulled at the rubber band that held one of her omnipresent buns together. She smiled contently when her long, chocolate brown tresses fell down to her right shoulder. Then she reached up and repeated the process for the left side, slipping the rubber bands around her wrist. When both of her buns were demolished, she ran her fingers through her tussled hair, trying futilely to straighten it out. She couldn't remember why she'd started wearing her hair up like that, but now she couldn't seem to stop. It was a habit, something she did for the sake of constancy, hoping that even when the rest of her world was sweeping past her eyes before they had a chance to focus, something would remain continuous.

She ran her fingers through her locks over and over, her mind no longer connected to the action. When she finally realized what she was doing, she jerked her hand away from her hair, stiffly placing it by her side. Her mind felt cloudy, as if there was a barrier around it, making continuous thought impossible.

_Maybe I'm just tired…_she thought idly, her eyes drifting lazily to the setting sun. She should head home. She should try to get some sleep. But she didn't readily care about what she _should_ do. She very much preferred to just stand there in the diminishing light and not move, not speak. Not think. Not even breathe, were that possible.

She stood there, staring at the sun, her corneas not bothered by its rays. It was too low in the sky and mostly covered by clouds that made it really more of a shiny circle than a nearby star. She was awed by the changing colors of the star and its bodyguard-clouds, not to mention the purple/pink/orange/yellow sky. She felt a keen desire to reach out and touch the pink cotton-candy that floated sluggishly around the sun, but she restrained herself. They were better off where they were.

Suddenly, but not completely unexpectedly, she felt a second, familiar presence in the training field. She did not turn to face him, or even acknowledge his arrival. Under normal circumstances, she would've run to meet him and shouted inquiries about his latest mission, but not today. Today she was content to stare at the sky and just enjoy the strength emanating from the very core of his existence. She closed her eyes. In her mind's eye, she could picture his lovely lavender eyes staring at the back of her head, his long, dark hair pulsing slightly with the breeze. She could picture his small, tentative smile, though she really had no idea what expression his face presently held. Whenever she thought of him, he was always smiling. She'd always loved his smile. Even when they were just Academy students, the hesitant sincerity in the innocent expression had fascinated her, and she had practically made it her nindo to keep that expression plastered on his face for as long as possible.

Easier said than done, of course, but she still managed to do it sometimes. Sometimes when she would crack a joke about their green-clad teammate and sensei, she would see the corners of his lips turn up in mild amusement. Sometimes, when she had exhausted all of her energy training, virtually crumpling into a mass of skin, hair, and clothes with fatigue, she would see a comforting, encouraging half-circle on his face. Sometimes, when he had family problems and ran away to the training field to take out his pent-up aggression on the poor, defenseless trees, she would appear to his side to promise him that everything would be okay, and he would reward her naïve, empty, and nevertheless sincere promises with a small parting of his pale lips.

God, she lived for those moments.

As she opened her eyes, she wondered idly how long her pale, cryptic teammate planned on standing silently behind her, but she didn't really care. Just his presence, even if he wasn't in sight, was enough to make the previously lovely sight before her…whimsical somehow. Dreamlike, even. She never would have noticed how much like a watercolor painting the sky looked like if his presence hadn't sent her senses into high-gear.

She didn't have to wonder for long. He silently made his way to her side, and instinctively followed her gaze to the silhouetted sun, squinting as his more-sensitive eyes rebuked him for the action. He did not move his eyes, though, which for some strange reason interested the girl immensely. She stared at him rather than the sky for a few too-brief moments, taking in his manly beauty in one gulp. Then he turned his face slightly to the side to meet her gaze, and she looked away immediately. Once again, a small, amused smile graced his too-perfect features. It disappeared as soon as she had registered what it was, but it had still been there.

They both returned their attention to the darkening sky.

She could feel him next to her. She could feel his power, his strength, and his omnipresent confidence. But she could also feel his inner turmoil as if it were a part of her, and his hidden pain stung her just as clearly as if it had been her own. That is how it had always been with the stoic young man, though. It was as if they were two halves of the same being, destined by fate to meet, just as they were destined to know exactly how the other felt at any and all moments. They were like one being, though neither had ever acknowledged this fact in their words or in their actions. It was just a fact that stayed with them at all times, never letting up.

And they enjoyed it to no end.

She looked at him again, though this time she did it out of the corner of her eye.

He repeated the action, looking into her eyes with unwavering inner strength. But still, she could feel his pain, and she hated it. She faced him full-on, looking into his eyes with nothing but tenderness and concern. Her eyes always held that for him, and he appreciated always having someone to come to when he needed to feel…wanted. He put a hand to her face, noticing with divine pleasure that her cheeks reddened just a little.

She stood there silently, awed and grateful for his wordless display of affection. She hesitantly stepped forward to wrap her arms around his waist, using her body to offer him comfort and affection, if he would accept it. His arms hung in the air for a moment, surprised by the warmth of her gesture, before he in turn wrapped his arms around her slender body. The feel of their bodies pressed together was almost akin finishing a puzzle long since given up on. It was a heady, euphoric feeling that kept their bodies glued together, keeping them both silent and unwilling to move.

They stood like that, still completely silent, until darkness hung over them like an ominous black blanket. She backed away from him, took her hand in his, and started to walk away. But he stopped her, and turned her to face him. He had a look of determination in his usually-unreadable eyes that frightened her to the point that it became pleasure. She still did not say a word, though she parted her lips as if to comment.

He took advantage of the current position of her lips, swiftly covering them with his own. She kissed him back for a brief second, completely on cloud nine, but then he pulled away. He looked at her with warm, content eyes, and then kept walking.

She felt pride within him, courage. The contact between them had been brief, but they would both carry it with them for the rest of their existence. Because now, they were one in more ways than just spiritually.

And all without a word having been spoken between the two.

* * *

**_There you go! A pointless little oneshot! _**

**_I really just wrote this to battle my brief case of writer's block, and i think it worked out alright. I don't particularly like the ending, just because it seems a little rushed, but whatever. This fic hardly matters all that much. ((unless people end up liking the product of my frustration.))_**

**_I'll keep trying to write, and maybe i'll come up with more soon._**

**_Until next time,_**

**_Miyazaki A2_**


End file.
